Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / Screens, Teens, and the Limits They Secretly Want

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Screens, Teens, and the Limits They Secretly Want · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: This is the Happy Families Podcast. Should you trust your
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: children to select their own apps, their own screen limits?
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: Is it reasonable to expect that a teenager who is
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: going to understand what is good for them and what
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: is not. That is our tricky question today from Shannon
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: on the Gold Coast. We're going to step right into
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: this screen dilemma. Next, stay with us.
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: Today.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: This is the Happy Families Podcast, Real Parenting Solutions, every
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: single day. It's Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast. We are
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: Justin and Kylie Coulson, and every Tuesday on the pod
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: we answer your tricky questions about screens and family and
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: discipline and relationships and all of the tough stuff that
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: drives you bonkers when it comes to raising your children.
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: If you would like to submit a tricky question, we've
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: got a super simple system at Happy families dot com
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: dot Au. You just scroll down to podcasts, click the
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: record button and start talking. Or you can send a
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: voice note to podcasts at Happy Families dot com dot au.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: That's podcasts with an s at happy families dot com
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: dot Au. Kylie Today, a question about kids and screens.
• 1:14
  Speaker 3: This is Shannon from the Gold Coast. My question is
• 1:18
  Speaker 3: when speaking to other parents of teenagers, they tell me
• 1:21
  Speaker 3: that they don't need to put filtering applications on their
• 1:25
  Speaker 3: children's devices because they trust their children. I struggle with this,
• 1:30
  Speaker 3: and I'm not quite sure how to navigate these conversations.
• 1:33
  Speaker 3: I also wonder why they think this. I'd appreciate your insight, Kylie.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: You're making a funny face as you hear that question.
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: I mean, I'm not big on filtering. I don't like filters.
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: I find them time consuming. The kids will find a
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: way around them. I'm not convinced that filter is the
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: best way forward. But I don't trust teenagers when it
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: comes to smartphones. I talk to kids almost every single
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: day in schools, and they've told me quite clearly that
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: we should not be trusting them when it comes to
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: their use of smartphones and their selection of apps and
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: their use of those apps.
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: It's interesting because I probably wouldn't use the word trust
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: when I am thinking about kids and screens.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: I would. I don't trust them. I don't trust me
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: or you like.
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: They no, but they don't have the they don't have
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: the maturity in any way, shape or form, So trusting
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: them maybe it's just semantics, but I think they don't.
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: They don't have the maturity or the understanding to know
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: what they're actually dealing with, and therefore it's not so
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: much about trust. It's about a lack of skill and
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: a lack of experience. And so for me, it's not
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: so much about trust. It's actually about scaffolding them to
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: set them up for success.
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: Well, I guess what's really coming through here with Channon's
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: question is that the parents aren't having the conversations at all.
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: They're not putting any filters on. They just trust their kids,
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: full stop, end of story.
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: They're saying that they trust their kids. But I don't
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: actually think but I think it's just an oversimplified acknowledgment
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: that to do anything else is just too hard. Firstly,
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: and secondly, I think it's ignorance on their part, because
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: I don't actually believe that they have a firm grasp
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: on the filth the playground that their children are navigating.
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I'm going to share a story about that in
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: just a sec. But before I do that, just want
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: to talk about the algorithm real quick. Like parents might
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: often say to me, well, I just don't think it's
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: that bad, And I always said that's because your algorithm
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: gives you all the stuff that you really like. You're
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: getting all the nice, fluffy stuff, the warm stuff you're getting,
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: the things that make you laugh and keep you drawn in.
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: I know when you first started like teaching this stuff,
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: I used to look at you and go, is it
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: really like that? Because, like you said, that's exactly right.
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: My algorithms was giving me all of the feel goods
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: that I was looking for. Yeah, and I still today
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: still struggle to believe that the stuff that's there is
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: out there because I don't find it.
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: So I shared on the pod about six months ago,
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: as I've been writing this Boy's book, I made a
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: terrible mistake with my Instagram and decided that I was
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: going to pretend to be a teenage boy for a
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: couple of weeks. So I started liking. I literally started
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: to search for and then like the kinds of things
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: that we hear about boys liking and being fed through
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: their algorithm. And what I forgot was that when I
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: like stuff, that other people who are following me can
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: see what I'm liking. And so our teenage daughter came
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: to you and said, Mummy, you're aware of what that's doing.
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: On Instagram, like, he's been liking some pretty wild stuff.
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: But what happened outside of that? Once we explained what
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: I was doing and the experiment ceased fairly quickly. What
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: did happen is I started to you don't even have
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: to like it, you just have to watch it, And
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: the algorithm is measuring to the millisecond how much time
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: you're spending watching that content, and it starts to feed
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: you more of it. And within about two weeks, my
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: feed became full full of really violent stuff, really misogynistic stuff,
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: and also quite saucy, very very saucy content as well.
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: And I deleted my Instagram account because I was kept
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: on trying to find the stuff that I used to
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: like and like all of that, and the algorithm kept
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: on pushing me that more extreme content and it was
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: not content that I would be comfortable with anyone picking
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: up and seeing. That's what that Experiments have been done
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: where teenage boys have been put in as the like
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: it's a teenage boy using this phone, or as a
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: teenage boys account, even though it's been adults doing it.
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: They've done experiments both in the media and at universities,
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: and they've found exactly what I found when I was
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: doing that experiment pretty wild, pretty intense stuff. So I
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: just want to emphasize you can't trust your kids because
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: they will be fed a whole lot of stuff in
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: their algorithm that you're not being fed in yours.
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: Well, not only that they're following friends, right and like
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: you said, you like something, and then all of your
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: friends know what you liked, and so they're being fed
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: all of their friends stuff regardless of whether they're that
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: kind of kid, because of the very fact that they're
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: playing in the same playground as other kids.
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: Totally, totally, and they all get caught in on their
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: Snapchat group chats or their Instagram group chats or whatever.
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: There's been so many allegations, so many schools now where
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: big groups of like half a grave if not more,
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: are all on these group chats where they're sharing this
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: is the cess pit that they play in, and I
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: think that it's a really big problem. Our kids do
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: need limits, and after the break, we're going to talk
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: about what those limits need to be so that you
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: can actually trust your kids to be on these devices.
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: One of my favorite analogies is a story shared by
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: Josh Ship. He's an American youth speaker, and he used
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: to he used to talk about this thing where when
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: you're get on a roller coaster, the restraints they come
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: down onto your knees and they come down across your chest,
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: those great big mechanized I mean, I'm calling them restraints whatever,
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: those things, it's a call that hold you in place
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: when the roller coaster is going upside down. And he
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: describes how once they come down, what do we do
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: while we start to push against them and asks why.
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: He explains that we're maybe pushing against them a bit
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: because they're uncomfortable, because they do squeeze you a bit,
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: But more than anything, we're pushing against them because we
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: want to know that they are going to stay in
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: place in thirty seconds when we are upside down and
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: zooming through whatever place the roller coaster is going to
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: take us to. In other words, we say that we
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: don't like the restraints, but we actually need them, We
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: want them, and we're grateful for them. When it comes
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: to kids and limits, whether it's around screens or anything else,
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: I think that that analogy is just perfect, Kylie. It's
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: exactly what we need to focus on.
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: So I push on them a little bit differently. When
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: I'm sitting there, I'm pushing on it. Firstly, I want
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: to test it and make sure it's going to hold me.
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: But secondly, I actually find there's a little bit of movement,
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: and when I'm upside down, I don't like the moon
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: So I like my back firmly pressed against the back
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: of the seat. And if I push against that seatbelt,
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: then I'm going to be sure that I'm not going anywhere.
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: I love it. Okay, So Shannon, here's what we're going
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: to talk about. The three e's of effective discipline. This
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: is where we need to land here. Explore, explain empower,
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: and to describe how that works. I want to share
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: one of my all time favorite stories and experience that
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: we had with our eldest daughter when she was thirteen
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: and snapchat had just come on the scene. So for
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: those who are new to the pod and haven't heard
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: it before, Explore Explain empower. It's the three eas of
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: effective discipline. It's a model that I developed probably ten
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: or fifteen years ago, probably a round about the same
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: time that Snapchat came out and I was dealing with
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: our daughter and her challenges. Explore means that we try
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: to see the world through another person's eyes. We get
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: their perspective. Explain means that we make sure that they
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: understand the rationale for our requests. And empower means that
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: we give our kids the opportunity to develop a solution
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: to this challenge with us. It's problem solved together. So
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: let's go back to twenty twelve. Twenty thirteen. Snapchat is
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: fairly new. Sheanelle comes home one day and says, Dad, Dad, Dad,
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: can I please have Snapchat? And my response is no way.
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: You know what I do for work. You know that
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: I'm aware of what Snapchat's all about. There's a huge
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: amount of content that is going out on Snapchat that
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: I'm not comfortable with. So the answer is no. And
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: she says, but Dad, but all my friends have got it.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: And I said, well, all of your friends are on
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: Facebook Messenger as well. Get them to talk to you
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: on Messenger and she said they won't. I saw, well,
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: that's just silly. Tell them that I said that they
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: have to. And she said, oh right, because they're going
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: to say, well, since your dad says you have to,
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: then that's and she just showed me they were all
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: chatting on Snapchat. But they were not they were ghosting
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: or on Facebook Messenger because they'd all moved on. This
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: was how they were operating in twenty and twelve or
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: whatever it was. And so I said, well, Chanel, I
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: just don't want you to have it, and I'm putting
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: my foot down on the parent and I've got the
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: ride every now and again to just say a flat
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: out no. And she was persistent. She said, Dad, you're
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: supposed to explore, explain, and empower. I've been to your seminars.
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: So she knew that that was what the what the
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: deal was supposed to be, and so she didn't miss much. No, No,
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: I thought to myself, I'm never taking her to a
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: seminar again. So I said, fine, let's explore why do
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: you need it? And she said because all my friends
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: have got it. I said, is that it? And she
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: said yes. I'm like, well, your list is not very good.
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: Here's mine. Let me explain to you why do I
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: want you to have it. So I opened both barrels
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: and gave her like the seven, eight, nine, ten things
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: that kept me from wanting her to be on Snapchat.
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: And I said, so, I'm not going to empower you
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: because my list is better than yours. Like I win
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: it's ten to one or five to one or whatever
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: it is. And I was ready to walk away, and
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: she said, Dad, you're not being fair. And I said
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: it doesn't feel fair, but sometimes as a parent, you've
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: just got to look after your kids. That's my job.
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: And she said, I just want to be on Snapchat
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: with my friends. And I said, tell them to talk
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: to you on Messenger. And then she said something really
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: really smart. She said, Dad, you're telling me to talk
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: to my friends on Messenger when they're on Snapchat. Is
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: like you telling me to go play in the park
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: while all my friends are at the beach. And that
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: just hit different for me that she actually got me.
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: She drew me back in and I said, that's fine.
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: But at the beach there's blue bottles and sharks, there's
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: ribs and sweeps and currents, there's the sun, there's syringes
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: and broken glass in the sand.
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: There's Paul, always finding the problems, always finding the problems.
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: And I said, I don't want you at the beach.
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: I want you in the park. And she looked at me.
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: I kid you not, this is a dead set truly,
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: what she said. She said Dad, have you been to
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: the park lately? And I was like, Oh, she's right,
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: She's right. The park is a concerning place at times.
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: I knew that Facebook Messenger was probably not quite as
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: bad as Snapchat, but was still a concerning place to be.
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: And so that led to us having a conversation about
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: how she could potentially have Snapchat, which was completely different
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: to what I thought the conversation would be ten minutes earlier.
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: And she didn't continue to metaphor conversation. But had she
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: done so? What she was essentially saying is, Dad, if
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: I promised to swim in the flags, slip slop slap
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: were appropriate clothing, stay only with my friends, and let
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: you swing by the beach anytime to check in on
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: me to make sure I'm doing okay, would it be
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: okay if I go to the beach? And I was like, damn,
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: that's good. And so we decided to go for a
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: trial and we never really looked bad. Now does that
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: mean that I trust my child? No, we had high
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: levels of supervision. There was a high level of accountability,
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: but we worked out a solution where we could feel
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: good about this together. Sometimes the answer still has to
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: be no, full stop. End of story. But in that instance,
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: it was fine.
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: The thing that stands out to me with Shannon's question
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: is the realization that often parenting feels like a really
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: lonely game. We are doing it on our own because
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: everyone around us seems to have a different opinion. And
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: the thing we have to remember is that nobody, nobody
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: is going to love our kids the way we will,
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: and it's our job to do everything we can to
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: protect them and keep them safe. But my second thinking
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: around this is the acknowledgment that finding your village of
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: like minded families can take time, but in doing so
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: in so many ways, makes your job so much easier,
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: because when you've got other friends whose parents have the
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: same ideals as you and are striving for the same
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: things as you, all of a sudden, it's no longer
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: you know your child coming home and saying everybody else
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: is doing it because you know X, Y and Z
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: are not.
• 13:38
  Speaker 3: That's right.
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: Build the community, get the relationships, talk to the other parents,
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: form a coalition, but then support your children. You can't
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: just say, well, we've decided no screens. You've got to say,
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: and because there are no screens, here's what we're going
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: to do to support our kids to have healthy lives,
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: healthy relationships, and good balance. The community isn't just we're
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: all on the same page, no screens. It's about so
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: much more than that social media minimum age legislation coming
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: in at the end of the year December ten. I
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: think that's going to be a game change up. It's
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: not going to completely solve the problem, not even close,
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: but it will help us to make some positive steps
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: and I'm really positive about that. So, Shannon, we really
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: hope that that's been helpful. Thanks so much for sending
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: the question through. If you've got a tricky question that
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: you'd like to ask us, go to Happy Families dot
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: com dot you click on this super simple system where
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: you just push the button and start talking and hopefully
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: we'll feature you on the podcast. The Happy Families podcast
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: is produced by Justin Roland from Bridge Media. Mimhammonds provides
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: research and additional admin support. Oh and if you'd like
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: to get a really really high quality webinar about this
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: topic to help you to navigate the issues, we'll link
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: to one of my webinars in the show notes that
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: will give you all the guidance you need. Check out
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: Happy families dot com dot au for more resources. And
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: we're back tomorrow with a conversation with Professor Wayne Warburton
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: where we go a little bit deeper on this big
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: screen issue. Talk to you then,